Group recommendations based on external factors

ABSTRACT

A system and method for providing a group recommendation is disclosed. First a group having at least one member is defined. A group profile having at least one activity and a set of conditions for the activity are created. Based on the set of conditions a corresponding set of trigger events are identified. A number of electronic data sources are monitored for information related to set of conditions. The monitored set of conditions are compared against the set of trigger events. If the threshold between the set of conditions and the set of trigger events is met, then an alert is generated that is presented to the members of the group.

BACKGROUND

The present disclosure relates generally to the field of naturallanguage processing, and, more particularly, to using natural languageprocessing in making recommendations to individuals and users.

As a field of computer science, natural language processing tends tofocus on the relationships between computer systems and human languages.Many modern natural language processing algorithms are derived based onmachine learning and rely greatly on statistical inferences. Byanalyzing large sets of real-world examples of natural language usages,a computer system may be able to glean sets of rules that guide themachine through a future analysis of natural language passages.

Recommendations and recommender systems make recommendations to usersbased on a comparison of the user's profile with profiles of other userswho make use of a marketplace. However, these recommendations havehistorically been based off of the relationships between items.Typically, this has been in the form of “people who have bought thishave also bought these items”. More advanced systems of recommendationslook at the items themselves to determine if the items are related, andthe user may be interested in the items based on a similarity betweenthe item being looked at and these items. However, these recommendationsystems are limited in that they are based on the needs of the merchantoffering the recommendations and not based on other needs, wants ordesires of the consumer. The goal of the recommendation systems is tohave the user buy a particular item from the merchant.

SUMMARY

Embodiments of the present disclosure include a method for providingrecommendations to a group based on the profiles of theindividuals/groups and the features of various activities, events,locations, etc., as well as a computer program product and a system forimplementing the method. As part of the method, a group having at leastone member is defined. A group profile having at least one activity anda set of conditions for the activity are created. Based on the set ofconditions a corresponding set of trigger events are identified. Anumber of electronic data sources are monitored for information relatedto set of conditions. The monitored set of conditions are comparedagainst the set of trigger events. If the threshold between the set ofconditions and the set of trigger events is met, then an alert isgenerated that is presented to the members of the group.

The above summary is not intended to describe each illustratedembodiment or every implementation of the present disclosure.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The drawings included in the present disclosure are incorporated into,and form part of, the specification. They illustrate embodiments of thepresent disclosure and, along with the description, serve to explain theprinciples of the disclosure. The drawings are only illustrative oftypical embodiments and do not limit the disclosure.

FIG. 1 illustrates a block diagram of an example computing environmentin which illustrative embodiments of the present disclosure may beimplemented.

FIG. 2 illustrates a block diagram of an exemplary architecture,including a natural language processing system, configured to identifysignificant features and context in electronic content, in accordancewith embodiments of the present disclosure.

FIG. 3 is a diagrammatic representation recommender system andapplication according to illustrative embodiments of the presentdisclosure.

FIG. 4 is a flow diagram illustrating a process for making travelrecommendations for a group according to illustrative embodiments.

FIG. 5 is a flow diagram illustrating a process for forming a group ofindividuals who have similar interests according to illustrativeembodiments.

FIG. 6 is a flow diagram of a process for providing recommendations thatgo against a currently existing profile for an individual or a groupaccording to illustrative embodiments.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart illustrating a process of providing proactiverecommendations according to illustrative embodiments.

FIG. 8 is a block diagram illustrating a computing system according toone embodiment.

FIG. 9 is a diagrammatic representation of an illustrative cloudcomputing environment.

FIG. 10 illustrates a set of functional abstraction layers provided bycloud computing environment according to one illustrative embodiment.

While the embodiments described herein are amenable to variousmodifications and alternative forms, specifics thereof have been shownby way of example in the drawings and will be described in detail. Itshould be understood, however, that the particular embodiments describedare not to be taken in a limiting sense. On the contrary, the intentionis to cover all modifications, equivalents, and alternatives fallingwithin the spirit and scope of the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Aspects of the present disclosure relate generally to the field ofnatural language processing, and in particular to providingrecommendations to individuals, groups or combinations thereof based onthe analysis of external events and conditions. This information iscontained in a variety of data sources which present data or informationin natural language, which must be analyzed for a computer system and/orcomputing application to generate meaning and understand. While thepresent disclosure is not necessarily limited to such applications,various aspects of the disclosure may be appreciated through adiscussion of various examples using this context.

Currently, individuals don't have an easy way to get a quick insightinto what is available to them that also matches their taste andinterests. There are some major events that are quick to identify (e.g.major sports games, museums, concerts, festivals, etc.), but there arean infinite number of places and activities that could be of interest toan individual. Often these activities and places are only familiar to afew (typically local) individuals. Furthermore, some events oractivities, are only of interest to certain individuals based on, forexample, their hobbies, personality, interests, etc. Only a personfamiliar with these particular events and/or activities, and who alsoknows the particular individual very well, for example, at a personallevel, would be able to provide those particular insights to theindividual. As a result, there are an infinite number of missedopportunities that would have resulted in the individual being able todo the activities that they would enjoy the most at a particular place.Having this information would enhance the quality and enjoyment of theirtravel or other experience.

Also, currently, individuals have a very short time window to try tomaximize the use of their time while they're on vacation and away fromwork or other commitments. The average person in the US spends only 16days of their allocated 22 days of vacation and holidays. Overall, in2016 Americans had over 658 million vacation days that went unused. Asmall number of individuals plan their itinerary at a destination ingreat detail in advance of arriving at a destination. At mostindividuals, typically, identify a few key activities that they wouldlike to do at the location, and leave the rest to sort out once they arethere. Many times these activities are the “popular” activities at thelocation. Many individuals do research online and on their mobiledevices once they are at their destination. This approach consumesprecious vacation time that the individuals could better use, andresults in missed opportunities and lost vacation time. With the vastamount of information currently available online, through variousdifferent data sources, it is impossible for an individual to browsethrough this enormous amount of online information, as well as anyonline reviews of each potential activity, location, event, etc.Further, this information is in a constant state of flux, constantlychanging as new information and/or reviews are posted for both new andexisting activities. Additionally, there are numerous new sources ofinformation that come online on a regular basis. Some of these sites arelegitimate sites providing relatively unbiased information aboutactivates, locations, events, products, etc. However, it is relativelyeasy to create online information that provides highly biased viewpointson the activities, locations, events, products, etc., either to drivetraffic to or away from the particular products. Identifying thelegitimate sites from the biased sites can also be a challenge. Theamount of information makes it impossible to have a thorough analysis ofthe potential options without sacrificing a considerable amount ofvacation time. Conversely, sacrificing this time to look at all thepotential options, opinions and reviews, makes it increasingly likelythat the selected activity won't be enjoyable, have good quality or be agood fit for the individuals.

It's also increasingly difficult finding an activity that every personwithin the same group would enjoy doing. This group can be a grouptraveling or can be any type of group that desires to do thingstogether. This takes additional research and discussion to takeeveryone's ideal activities in consideration. This results in even morewasted time, and potentially choosing an activity that some people inthe group will not enjoy.

As discussed above, aspects of the disclosure may relate to naturallanguage processing to provide recommendations. Accordingly, anunderstanding of the embodiments of the present disclosure may be aidedby describing embodiments of natural language processing systems and theenvironments in which these systems may operate. Turning now to thefigures, FIG. 1 illustrates a block diagram of an example computingenvironment 100 in which illustrative embodiments of the presentdisclosure may be implemented. In some embodiments, the computingenvironment 100 may include a remote device 102 and a host device 112.

Consistent with various embodiments, the remote device 102 and the hostdevice 112 may be computer systems. The remote device 102 and the hostdevice 112 may include one or more processors 106 and 116 and one ormore memories 108 and 118, respectively. The remote device 102 and thehost device 112 may be configured to communicate with each other throughan internal or external network interface 104 and 114. The networkinterfaces 104 and 114 may be, for example, modems or network interfacecards. The remote device 102 and/or the host device 112 may be equippedwith a display or monitor. Additionally, the remote device 102 and/orthe host device 112 may include optional input devices (e.g., akeyboard, mouse, or other input device), and/or any widely available orcustom software (e.g., browser software, communications software, searchengine and/or web crawling software, natural language processingsoftware, etc.). In some embodiments, the remote device 102 and/or thehost device 112 may be servers, desktops, laptops, or hand-held devices.

The remote device 102 and the host device 112 may be distant from eachother and communicate over a network 150. In some embodiments, the hostdevice 112 may be a central hub from which remote device 102 canestablish a communication connection, such as in a client-servernetworking model. Alternatively, the host device 112 and remote device102 may be configured in any other suitable networking relationship(e.g., in a peer-to-peer configuration).

In some embodiments, the network 150 can be implemented using any numberof any suitable communications media. For example, the network 150 maybe a wide area network (WAN), a local area network (LAN), or theInternet. In certain embodiments, the remote device 102 and the hostdevice 112 may be local to each other and communicate via anyappropriate local communication medium. For example, the remote device102 and the host device 112 may communicate using a local area network(LAN), one or more hardwire connections, or a wireless link. In someembodiments, the remote device 102 and the host device 112 may becommunicatively coupled using a combination of one or more networksand/or one or more local connections. For example, the first remotedevice 102 may be hardwired to the host device 112 (e.g., connected withan Ethernet cable) while a second remote device (not shown) maycommunicate with the host device using the network 150 (e.g., over theInternet).

In some embodiments, the network 150 can be implemented within a cloudcomputing environment, or using one or more cloud computing services.Consistent with various embodiments, a cloud computing environment mayinclude a network-based, distributed data processing system thatprovides one or more cloud computing services. Further, a cloudcomputing environment may include many computers (e.g., hundreds orthousands of computers or more) disposed within one or more data centersand configured to share resources over the network 150.

In some embodiments, the remote device 102 may enable users to submit(or may submit automatically with or without user input) electronicdocuments (e.g., web pages, social media feeds and profiles, etc)containing profile information or information useful for determining thepreferences of the user to the host devices 112 in order to have theprofile information ingested and analyzed for sentiment (e.g., bynatural language processing system 122). For example, the remote device102 may include submission module 110 and a user interface (UI). Thesubmission module 110 may be in the form of a web browser, application,or any other suitable software module, and the UI may be any type ofinterface (e.g., command line prompts, menu screens, graphical userinterfaces). The UI may allow a user to interact with the remote device102 to submit, using the submission module 110, one or more web pages orsocial media feeds containing information related to the interests ofthe submitter to the host device 112. In some embodiments, thesubmission module 110 may incorporate a web crawler or other softwarethat allows the module to search for and automatically identify profileinformation for submission to the host device 112. In some embodiments,the submission module may also receive information related to reviews ofactivities, locations, events, etc.

In some embodiments, the information being submitted via the submissionmodule 110 may all belong to (or may have all been created on a websitethat is owned by) the same entity that is submitting them for analysis.This may occur, for example, when an airline submits customerinformation that was provided directly to the airline by customers whohave purchased travel from the airline. In some other embodiments, theentity submitting the information may be different from the entity thatoriginally received (e.g., collected) the individual profiles or reviewsfrom consumers. This may occur, for example, when the entity receivesreviews from a third party (e.g., a consumer survey company), for freeor for a fee, and then submits these reviews for analysis.

In some embodiments, the remote device 102 may further include a ranknotification receiver module 111. This module may be configured toreceive notifications, from the host device 112, of the relative ranksof various features common to a group of activities, profiles,locations, products, etc. In some embodiments, these relative ranks maythen be used by the remote device 102 to aid prospective users indetermining which activities or recommendations are more important toconsider when selecting activities to engage in. For example, theserankings may incorporated (by either the remote device 102 or the hostdevice 112) into web pages that allow consumers to use these receivedrankings for sorting through products based on matches to the user'sprofile by the recommendation system.

In some embodiments, the host device 112 may include a natural languageprocessing system 122. The natural language processing system 122 mayinclude a natural language processor 124, a rank notifier 126, and asentiment ranker 130. The natural language processor 124 may includenumerous subcomponents, such as a tokenizer, a part-of-speech (POS)tagger, a semantic analyzer, and a syntactic analyzer. An examplenatural language processor is discussed in more detail in reference toFIG. 2.

In some embodiments, the sentiment ranker 130 may be configured tofeatures based on an analysis of the sentiment associated with ingestedand annotated reviews. In addition, the rank notifier 126 may beconnected to the sentiment ranker module 130 and may serve to notify auser at the remote system 102 (e.g., via the rank notification receivermodule 111) of the relative ranks of the suggestions or recommendations.

In some embodiments, the natural language processing system 122 mayfurther include a search application (not shown). The search applicationmay be implemented using a conventional or other search engine, and maybe distributed across multiple computer systems. The search applicationmay be configured to search one or more databases or other computersystems for profiles or reviews that are related to a target group ofindividuals or activities. For example, the search application may beconfigured to search a corpus of information related to reviewspreviously submitted by the submission module 110 in order to identifyadditional relevant reviews and profiles of those who submitted thereviews.

While FIG. 1 illustrates a computing environment 100 with a single hostdevice 112 and a single remote device 102, suitable computingenvironments for implementing embodiments of this disclosure may includeany number of remote devices and host devices. The various modules,systems, and components illustrated in FIG. 1 may exist, if at all,across a plurality of host devices and remote devices. For example, someembodiments may include two host devices. The two host devices may becommunicatively coupled using any suitable communications connection(e.g., using a WAN, a LAN, a wired connection, an intranet, or theInternet). The first host device may include a natural languageprocessing system configured to ingest and annotate product reviews, andthe second host device may include a software module configured tocompare and rank product features based on the ingested product reviews.

It is noted that FIG. 1 is intended to depict the representative majorcomponents of an exemplary computing environment 100. In someembodiments, however, individual components may have greater or lessercomplexity than as represented in FIG. 1, components other than or inaddition to those shown in FIG. 1 may be present, and the number, type,and configuration of such components may vary.

Referring now to FIG. 2, shown is a block diagram of an exemplaryarchitecture 200, including a natural language processing system 212,configured to use product reviews to rank product features, inaccordance with embodiments of the present disclosure. In someembodiments, a remote device (such as remote device 102 of FIG. 1) maysubmit electronic documents, webpages, social media feeds, etc(containing information to be analyzed to determine if conditions for atrigger event or trigger condition have occurred) to the naturallanguage processing system 212 which may be housed on a host device(such as host device 112 of FIG. 1). Such a remote device may include aclient application 208, which may itself involve one or more entitiesoperable to generate or modify information in the webpages that are thendispatched to a natural language processing system 212 via a network215.

Consistent with various embodiments, the natural language processingsystem 212 may respond to electronic document submissions sent by theclient application 208. Specifically, the natural language processingsystem 212 may analyze a received product reviews to aid in the analysisof the relative importance of product features for consumerconsideration. In some embodiments, the natural language processingsystem 212 may include a natural language processor 214, data sources228, a rank notifier 226, and a sentiment ranker 230.

The natural language processor 214 may be a computer modules thatanalyzes the received webpages, social media feeds, electronicdocuments, etc. The natural language processor 214 may use varioustechniques for analyzing electronic documents (e.g., syntactic analysis,semantic analysis, etc.). The natural language processor 214 may beconfigured to recognize and analyze any number of natural languages. Insome embodiments, the natural language processor 214 may parse passagesof the documents. Further, the natural language processor 214 mayinclude various modules to perform analyses of the information in theprocessed items. These modules may include, but are not limited to, atokenizer 216, a part-of-speech (POS) tagger 218, a semantic analyzer220, a syntactic analyzer 222, and sentiment analyzer 224.

In some embodiments, the tokenizer 216 may be a computer module thatperforms lexical analysis. The tokenizer 216 may convert characterstrings into ordered sets of tokens. A token may be a sequence ofcharacters included in an electronic document and classified as ameaningful representation. In some embodiments, the tokenizer 216 mayidentify lexemes in a received characters string and categorize them astokens. Further, in some embodiments, the tokenizer 216 may identifytext boundaries in an electronic document and divide any text passageswithin the document into their component text elements, such as words,phrases, and punctuation marks.

Consistent with various embodiments, the POS tagger 218 may be acomputer module that annotates words in passages based on theirrespective parts of speech (e.g., verbs, adverbs, nouns, possessivemarkers, conjunctions, pronouns, etc.). The POS tagger 218 may read apassage or other text in natural language and annotate each word ortoken a part of speech. The POS tagger 218 may determine the part ofspeech to which a word (or other token) corresponds based on thedefinitions and context. The context of a word may be determined basedon its relationships with associated words in a phrase, sentence, orpassage. In some embodiments, the context of a word may be dependent onone or more previously analyzed electronic documents (e.g., the contentof one document may shed light on the meaning of text elements inanother document, particularly if they are reviews of the same item). Insome embodiments, the POS tagger 218 may tag or otherwise annotatetokens of a passage with part of speech categories. These annotatedtokens may then be analyzed by other modules of the natural languageprocessing system 212.

In some embodiments, the semantic analyzer 220 may be a computer modulethat is configured to identify semantic relationships between tokens. Insome embodiments, the semantic relationship identifier 220 may discoverfunctional dependencies and other semantic relationships between tokens.

Consistent with various embodiments, the syntactic analyzer 222 may be acomputer module that is configured to identify syntactic relationshipsbetween tokens. The syntactic relationship identifier 222 may rely onformal or informal grammar rules to identify the grammatical structureof sentences (e.g., which words modify which other words, which noun isthe object of a verb, etc.).

Consistent with various embodiments, the sentiment analyzer 224 may be acomputer module that is configured to identify and categorize thesentiments associated with tokens of interest. In some embodiments, thesentiment analyzer may be configured to identify, within text passages,and annotate keywords that are preselected as high quality indicators ofsentiment polarity (e.g., indicators of positive sentiment could includebrilliant, excellent, or fantastic). Various tools and algorithms may beused the sentiment analyzer 224 as are known to those skilled in the art(e.g., Naïve Bayes lexical model).

In some embodiments, the natural language processor 214 may be acomputer module that may parse a document and generate an associateddata structures for one or more portions of the parsed document. Forexample, in response to receiving a set of reviews from a website thatincludes a collection of consumer reviews at the natural languageprocessing system 212, the natural language processor 214 may outputparsed text elements from the product reviews as data structures. Insome embodiments, a parsed passage may be represented in a graphstructure, such as a parse tree.

In some embodiments, the parsed outputs of the natural languageprocessor 214 may be stored as an information corpus 229 in one or moredata sources 228. In some embodiments, data sources 228 may include datawarehouses, document repositories, and information corpora. Theinformation corpus 229 may enable data storage and retrieval. In someembodiments, the information corpus 229 may store standardized andconsistent copies of the ingested and parsed reviews. Data stored in theinformation corpus 229 may be organized specifically to address thepurpose of the system's analysis of that data. For example, theinformation corpus 229 may store the ingested reviews based on groups ofrelated items (e.g., products of the same type, similar activities, etc)in order to make ranking features associated with the items easier. Insome embodiments, the information corpus 229 may be a relationaldatabase.

In some embodiments, the natural language processing system 212 mayinclude a sentiment ranker module 230. The sentiment ranker module 230may be a computer module that is configured to generate sentiment scoresfor specific forms of item features based on the analysis of annotatedreviews. The sentiment ranker module 230 may be further configured torank the item features based on these sentiment scores.

The rank notifier 226 may be a computer module that is configured tonotify users of item features rankings determined by the sentimentranker module 230. In some embodiments, the rank notifier 226 maycommunicate with a rank notification receiver module (such as module 111of FIG. 1).

FIG. 3 schematically shows a recommender system 300 operating to providerecommendations 355 to users such as user 301 that may access therecommender system 300 through an application, such as application 360using a device 370 according to illustrative embodiments. However, anyavailable recommender system may be used. As used herein, a user can bean individual or a group of individuals. Recommender system 300 in someembodiments, comprises an “explicit-implicit database” 331 comprisingexplicit and/or implicit data acquired responsive to preferencesexhibited by a population of users 301 for items in a catalog of items.Recommender system 300 may comprise a model maker 340 and a clusterengine 341 that cooperate to cluster related catalog items in catalogclusters and generate a clustered database 332. A recommender engine 350recommends catalog items from catalog clusters in clustered database332. The content of the items in clustered database can vary based onthe particular implementation of the application 360. In someembodiments, the catalog items adjust or are augmented based oninformation received or determined by the natural language processingsystem of FIGS. 1 and 2 discussed above.

Device 370 may be any device in which a user 301 interacts with theapplication 360 through a network 335 to receive recommendations 355 forcontent and or activities. (e.g. mobile phone, tablet computer, desktopcomputer, music player, etc). In some embodiments, the application isinstalled on the user's device and accesses content through network 335.The application 360 is in one embodiment a consumer application 360accessed by consumers or users 301 to purchase or obtain content andhave that content delivered to them via network 335. In someembodiments, the application 360 is a travel or lifestyle applicationthat allows the user to locate, find or otherwise review activities thatthey would desire to participate or engage in. The application 360permits the user to search for content and activities, and also providesrecommendations to the user about activities or content they may beinterested in by communicating with a recommender system 300.

In some embodiments, the application 360 is configured to generateprofiles 365 for the users of the recommendation system 300. Again, aprofile 365 can be an individual profile or a group profile. The profilecan be generated by profile builder 362. Examples of approaches togenerating profiles for the users is discussed in greater detail belowwith respect to FIGS. 2-4. The profiles that are generated for use bythe recommender system 300 can be customized based on the particular enduse of the application. That is, for example, if the application isconfigured to provide travel recommendations then the profiles can becustomized or tilted towards travel interests. In some embodiments, theapplication 360 does not generate the profiles itself, but acquires themfrom external sources that provide profiles for users or groups. In someembodiments, the profiles can be generated by the profile builder 362and also obtained from outside sources. The profiles 365 can be storedin a profile store 366. Profile store 366 may be any type of storagesystem that can store profile information of individuals and groups.Each profile 365 is stored as a separate profile from other profiles 365in the profile store.

Explicit data optionally comprised in explicit-implicit database 331includes information acquired by recommender system 300 responsive toexplicit requests for information submitted to users 301 in thepopulation. These requests can be obtained in one embodiment from theuser 301 when the user generates their personal profile with theapplication or first interacts with the device 370. Explicit requestsfor information may comprise, for example, questions in a questionnaire,requests to rank a book or movie for its entertainment value, requeststo express an opinion on quality of a product, or requests to provideinformation related to likes and dislikes. Implicit data in theexplicit-implicit database 331 can includes data acquired by therecommender system 300 responsive to observations of behavior of users301 in the population that is not consciously generated by an explicitrequest for information. For example, implicit data may comprise dataresponsive to determining how the user uses content displayed by thedevice 370.

Model maker 340 processes explicit and/or implicit data comprised inexplicit-implicit database 331 to implement a model for representingcatalog items that represents each of the catalog items by arepresentation usable to cluster the catalog items. Cluster engine 341processes the representations of the catalog items provided by modelmaker 340 to generate “clustered database” 332 in which the plurality ofcatalog items is clustered into catalog clusters, each of which groups adifferent set of related catalog items. While FIG. 3 schematically showsexplicit-implicit database 331 as separate from clustered database 332,clustered database 332 may be comprised in explicit-implicit database331. To generate clustered database 332, cluster engine 341 may, forexample, simply mark records in explicit-implicit database 331 toindicate clusters with which the records are associated.

Any of various models for providing representations of catalog items andmethods of processing the representations to cluster the catalog itemsand generate clustered database 332 may be used in practice of anembodiment of the invention. Model maker 340 may for example generaterepresentations of catalog items that are based on feature vectors.Optionally, model maker 340 represents catalog items by vectors in aspace spanned by eigenvectors, which are determined from a singularvalue decomposition (SVD) of a “ranking matrix” representing preferencesof users 301 for the catalog items. Model maker 340 may representcatalog items by trait vectors in a latent space determined by matrixfactorization of a ranking matrix. However, other methods may beemployed.

Cluster engine 341 optionally clusters catalog items in a same catalogcluster if same users exhibit similar preferences for the catalog items.Optionally, cluster engine 341 uses a classifier, such as a supportvector machine, trained on a subset of the catalog items to distinguishcatalog items and cluster catalog items into catalog clusters. In someembodiments, the cluster engine 341 uses an iterative k-means clusteringalgorithm to cluster vectors representing catalog items and generateclustered database 332.

FIG. 4 is a flow diagram illustrating a process for making travelrecommendations for a group according to illustrative embodiments. Theprocess discussed herein can be implemented using the natural languageprocessing system discussed above with respect to FIGS. 1 and 2, and therecommender system discussed above with respect to FIG. 3. While FIG. 4discusses travel recommendations, it should be noted that the processcould be used for other situations where a group recommendation toengage in a certain activity can be envisioned.

The process begins by defining the group. This is illustrated at step410. Typically, a group includes two or more individuals. However, insome embodiments, a group may only have a single member. One of themembers of the group may access an application 360, and define themembers of the group. In this approach the user may select the membersof the group from a set of their contacts. These contacts may becontacts, for example, in a phone, electronic address book, social mediasite, etc. The selection of the members of the group can be done throughan interface. In some embodiments, the group may be createdautomatically, by the application 360. In this approach the application360 can analyze the contacts of the user to identify those contacts thatlogically should form a group. This analysis can consider the profiles365 and profile data of each contact and based on information in theprofiles 365 create the various groups.

In some embodiments, the group can be formed in an ad hoc manner. Informing the group via an ad hoc approach the application 360 canconsider events occurring in the real world and convert those eventsinto interests. For example, the application 360 may determine thatthere is a forest fire that is threatening a horse farm. The application360 may have learned of this through its analysis of new websites. Theapplication 360 then converts the knowledge about the forest fire andthe horse farm into profile data that relates to interests in horses,owning a horse trailer, and the location of the fire. The application360 then uses this profile data and the location data to form a group ofindividuals who may have no previous knowledge of each other.

Once the group has been formed the user who formed the group can provideinformation to the application 360 related to an activity or activitiesthat the group desires to do. This is illustrated at step 420. Thisresults in the creation of a group profile for the members of the group.This is illustrated at step 425. Steps 420 and 425 will be discussedtogether. For example, the user could indicate that the group desires toon a ski trip. However, the user also indicates that they also desire togo on the ski trip only when there is going to be powder at the resort,and the cost of the airfare is less than $400.00. The user can furtherprovide more granularity to the application 360 by, for example,indicating further requirements on the trip, such as locations to avoid,cost of lift tickets, time restrictions, etc. This can be referred to asa set of conditions for the activity. In some embodiments, theapplication 360 can add additional limitations or restrictions to therequest. For example, the application 360 can scan the profiles 365 ofthe members of the group and identify additional interests of themembers of the group. These profiles 365 for the members can come fromother applications such as social media applications, or informationgleaned from contact information. During the scan the application 360can identify, for example, musical interests of the members of the groupas well as food preferences for the members of the group. Theinformation contained in the profiles 365 of the members of the groupcan include interests that the members had not considered as beingrelevant to the desired trip they are looking at doing. In someembodiments, multiple group profiles 365 can be created for the membersof the group to account for various differences in interests between themembers of the group. In this approach, there may be three or more groupprofiles 365 for the group. Each of these group profiles 365 areadditional group profiles 365 that are associated with the main groupprofile. These sub group profiles 365 can be created by the application360 or by the user who created the group. As an example of these subgroup profiles 365, while all members desire to go skiing, some membersof the group have an interest in snowmobiling, while some members havean interest in snowshoeing. Separate sub group profiles 365 may be madefor the members of the group who have these interests. Further, itshould be noted that membership in one of the sub group profiles 365 maybe, but does not have to be mutually exclusive. In some embodiments, theprofile for the group already exists and the group profile is simplyaccessed from the source that currently holds the corresponding groupprofile.

Once the group and the profile for the group have been formed theapplication 360 works in the background to identify a set of triggerevents that match the preferences and/or set of conditions defined forthe group activity in the group profile. This is illustrated at step430. The application 360 processes the information from the groupprofile into the set of trigger events. Trigger events are events thatcorrespond to the determined preferences of the group. To form thetrigger events the application 360 uses the information in the profileto identify locations and/or conditions that match the desired activityor purpose of the group. In the example of a ski trip, the application360 identifies a number of ski resorts and determines the location ofeach these ski resorts. To identify the location of the ski resorts theapplication 360 may implement natural language processing of internetsites related to skiing. In some embodiments, the application 360 accessa catalogue that includes information related to ski resorts. From thisinformation related to location of the ski resorts, the application 360generates the trigger events for the locations. In this example, thetrigger events can include monitoring the weather at each location thatwas identified, and to trigger an alert if the weather indicates thatthere will be a snowfall of more than 12 inches expected. Theapplication 360 can generate a second trigger event that monitorsairfare between the location of the members of the group and eachlocation determined for the ski resorts. As many ski resorts are inlocations that are not served by regular air service, the application360 can determine the airport or airports that are closest to theparticular ski resort. In some embodiments, the user may have indicatedin the group profile that they want a ski resort that is within aparticular distance of an airport. In this instance the application 360will generate the trigger for airfares to only those airports that arewithin the particular distance indicated by the user. Additional triggerevents based on the information entered by the user can be generated bythe application 360. The number of trigger events generated by theapplication 360 can be controlled by the user, or in some embodiments,controlled by the application 360. Further, depending on the type ofactivity desired, the number of triggers can vary. For example, a beachvacation may require more trigger events than a shopping trip to NewYork as the general conditions needed to make activity a success aremore for the beach than shopping. (e.g. Beach could have airfare,weather, lodging, timing as the trigger events, whereas shopping mayonly have airfare and sales as trigger events.)

In some embodiments, the application 360 uses the profiles 365 for themembers of the group to generate additional activities, sets ofconditions for the activities, and trigger events for the activities.For example, the profile for the members of the group indicate that themembers have an interest in a particular type of music, or a particularmusical group. The application 360 can, based on this information,generate one or more trigger events for this particular interest. Thesetrigger events are generated by the application 360 outside of thespecific information provided by the user when defining/setting up thegroup profile. These trigger events are provided to alert the user toexperiences that may be of interest to the members of the group outsideof the primary reason for the creation of the group. When the group isan ad hoc group the application 360 can generate trigger events for thead hoc group for events that relate to the reason the ad hoc group wasformed. Using the example of the forest fire and the horse farm, theapplication 360 may create a trigger event for when the fire's edge iswithin a certain distance from the farm.

Once the trigger events have been defined for the group, the application360 monitors a variety of electronic information sources in order toidentify when a condition for a particular trigger event is met. This isillustrated at step 440. These information sources can include internetsites, blog posts, RSS feeds, social media platforms and posts, etc.Additional sources of information that can be monitored, can be basedupon the particular trigger events that were generated. For example, ifthere is a trigger event related to weather then weather relatedinformation sources may be monitored. The application 360 may prioritizeparticular trigger events over other trigger events, such that only aportion or subset of the set of trigger events is initially monitoredand compared. This may be done to preserve processing power or toenhance the overall efficiency of the application 360. Theprioritization can be provided by the user, group, or the application.For example, the application 360 may prioritize the weather triggerevent over the trigger event related to the cost of airfare. In thisinstance, the application 360 does not monitor or consider the airfarecondition and trigger event until such time as the weather trigger eventhas occurred or the associated condition has been met. The application360 can prioritize any number of trigger events. (e.g. the applicationcan consider the three highest trigger events before considering theremaining trigger events, or can process each trigger event in theircorresponding priority level). The application 360 may implement webcrawlers, bots, interactive web crawlers, interactive bots or otherapproaches to extract the information from the sites that contain orpublish the associated information. The extracted information isprocessed through a natural language processor to gain contextualknowledge about the information from the source. Returning to theweather based trigger event, the application 360 can understand based onthe contextual knowledge that a large snowfall is expected at aparticular location.

Following the extraction of the information from the informationsources, the application 360 proceeds to compare the extractedinformation against the conditions related to the trigger event orevents. This is illustrated at step 450. The application 360, forexample, uses the tokens generated by the natural language processingsystem to determine if the generated tokens and analysis of theparticular tokens meets the conditions for the trigger event. At thisstage the application 360 can use logic rules or other analyticalapproaches to determine if the condition is met. It should be noted thatany method for determining if a condition has been met can be used. Forexample, using the ski trip example, the application 360 could take atoken or string of tokens representing a predicted snowfall of one footand compare that to a trigger event for predicted snowfall of 12 inchesor more and determine that the trigger event has been met, as 12 inchesis equal to one foot.

If the conditions of the trigger events are met, (e.g. a particularamount of snow expected exceeds the threshold value, and the airfare isbelow a threshold value, and the resort is within the defined distancefrom the airport) the application 360 proceeds to send an alert to theuser or members of the group. This is illustrated at step 460. Thealerts can be sent to the user via email, text message, application 360method or any other means for alerting the user. However, in someembodiments, the alert can be sent when a threshold number of thetrigger events have been met. For example, an alert can be sent if thesnow total expected exceeds the threshold, and the airfare is below thethreshold cost, but the distance doesn't meet the required distance. Thealert, in some embodiments, includes information associated with why thealert was generated. This information can include, for example, detailsabout the event that alert is about as well as information as how to getto the event or book the event.

The user receives the alert from the application 360 and is then able toact on the alert. This is illustrated at step 460. In some embodiments,the alert includes information to book the event that caused the alert.For example, the alert could include a link or links to a website(s) topurchase tickets for the event, book travel to the event, etc. The usercan then follow the provided links to complete the transaction. In someembodiments, the application 360 has prepopulated the data required tobook the event. In this approach all the user has to do is complete thetransaction by providing any missing information required. In someembodiments, the application 360 is capable of completing the entirebooking process without the user providing any further information. Inthis embodiment, the user simply indicates that the wish to participatein the event, and the application 360 completes the entire bookingprocess in the background.

FIG. 5 is a flow diagram illustrating a process for forming a group ofindividuals who have similar interests based upon a trigger eventoccurring, according to illustrative embodiments. The process discussedherein can be implemented using the natural language processing systemdiscussed above with respect to FIGS. 1 and 2, and the recommendersystems discussed above with respect to FIG. 3.

The process begins by creating a profile for the individuals who canform members of the groups. This is illustrated at step 510. At thisstep the user provides basic information to the application 360 thatallows for the formation of a basic profile for the user. Thisinformation may include age, gender, name, location, contactinformation, their interests, hobbies etc. With this basic informationthe profile builder 362 builds the base profile for the user. In someembodiments, the profile builder 362 searches for profiles 365 thatalready exist for other users in the application 360 that are similar tothe information that the user has entered. If a similar profile is foundthe profile builder 362 may use that similar profile as a base togenerate the user's profile. However, in other embodiments the user'sbase profile is generated without concern for other users of application360. The individuals interact with the application 360 through the userinterface to provide the application 360 with basic information aboutthe individual. In some embodiments, the application 360 may probe theuser to provide more information based on the profile informationentered. For example, the application 360 may identify that a particularinterest or hobby can be further refined. The application 360 can thenprovide an interface for the user to provide further information thatbetter refines the interest in the profile.

Once the user has entered in their basic profile information theapplication 360 proceeds to enhance the user's profile. This isillustrated at step 520. The application 360 enhances the user profileby accessing social networks related to the individual. The application360 can query the users for information from the profiles 365 maintainedby any number of social networks. In order to obtain this profileinformation from the social networks the user may be presented with aninterface where they can enter in information related to the varioussocial networks that they belong to. This interface can present to theuser a list of known social networks, and ask the user to provide theircredentials to each of the social networks that they wish to shareinformation with the application 360. In other approaches the usermerely provides the information necessary for the profile builder 362 tolocate and access their profile on the social networks. The profilebuilder 362 access the user's profile and gathers their profileinformation from the corresponding social network. The profile builder362 can use any means that is permitted by the social network to gatherthe profile information. This can, for example, include usingapplication 360 programming interfaces exposed by the social network, orviewing the profile on the social network and scraping the datacontained in the account.

The profile builder 362 may further gather information about the userfrom other sources outside of the social networks. For example, theprofile builder 362 may search the computer or devices of the user foradditional information related to the user that may be helpful ingenerating the profile for the user. The profile builder 362 may accessa browser history for the user, the user's calendar, photos, documents,etc, and obtain information from these sources. This information mayinclude the actual data from the sources, or may include metadata fromthe sources, such as location data or tags in a photograph. Further, theuser can choose to provide the application 360, and hence the profilebuilder 362 information from non-social network sources. This caninclude information that is held by other companies, such as travelagencies, airlines, hotels, banks, etc. The profile builder 362 canaccess these sites of information to gather additional information thatmay be relevant to the generation of the enhanced profile for the user,such as travel plans, or bank balances.

Once the various information from the various sources of informationhave been gathered, the profile builder 362 proceeds to build a profilefor the user with the application 360. This is illustrated at step 530.The profile builder 362 can use any method for building the profile fromthe information gathered from the various sources by the profile builder362, and the information that was provided by the user in the creationof the initial profile. Once the profile is completed it is stored.

Following the completion of the generation of the profiles 365 for theusers of the system, the application 360 monitors various sources ofinformation to identify trigger events. This is illustrated at step 540.These trigger events can be events that the provider of the application360 has determined to be conditions that they desire to cause an alertto be generated. For example, an airline may desire to have a triggerevent when they have 10 empty seats on a particular flight to a specificdefinition. For example, the airline may determine that if there are 10seats from Minneapolis to Cancun Mexico in February for sale less than10 days prior to departure that there may be demand for this trip, butthat individuals may not be aware of the excess capacity and may beinterested in this trip. In another example, a bus company may have anunreserved bus that could be rented by a group if they were made awareof it. In yet another example a concert venue may have extra tickets fora show that they would like to sell. The application 360 can monitor forany number of trigger events that have been designated by the providerof the application 360. Further, in some embodiments, the application360 can identify the trigger events on its own. In some embodiments, theusers of the application 360 can create trigger events. For example, agroup of people have rented a bus to go on a ski trip. However, theyhave a few empty seats left that they desire to fill. One of the membersof this group can create a trigger event for the open seats on the busfor the ski trip.

When a trigger event is detected the application 360 proceeds togenerate a group or groups that may be interested in the trigger event.This is illustrated at step 550. Each trigger event has a set of profilecharacteristics associated with it that can be matched to profiles 365maintained by the application 360. The application 360 searches theprofiles 365 to find individual members who have profiles 365 thatindicate that they may be interested in the trigger event. For eachindividual identified the group association component looks for otherindividuals who match the profile of the trigger event, and also matchprofile of the particular individual. For example, the group associationcomponent may look at the individual's friend list and the profiles 365associated with those friends to determine if any of those friends haveprofiles 365 that match the trigger event as well. Individuals that aredetermined to match the profiles 365 are then aggregated into a newgroup. Depending on the parameters of the trigger event, the size of thegroup may be capped. If the size of the group is capped the groupassociation component of the application 360 may rank the individuals ofthe group based on performing a ranking of the matching of the profiles365 of the members. This ranking may consider how close the profiles 365of the individuals are to each other, such that profiles 365 that aremore similar to the individuals are ranked higher. In this wayindividuals with closer profiles 365 are considered for the group. Insome embodiments, the group association module can go beyond theprofiles 365 of the friend list of the individual, and into the “friendsof friends” and further to find profiles 365 of individuals that theindividual does not know, but may have similar interests and profiles365. Once a number of individual profiles 365 are found the group isformed. A number of groups may be formed at this step by the groupassociation module. These multiple groups may be related to each other,may have some cross over in members between them, or may be completelyseparate memberships. In some embodiments, in identifying theindividuals, the calendars of the individuals are considered. That isthey are only selected if their calendar indicates that they are freeduring the time period of the associated activity.

Once the group has been formed an offer to the group can be created bythe application 360. This is illustrated at step 560. In someembodiments, the application 360 may be pre-programmed with the offer toprovide to the group. For example, an airline may have determined thatif there are 10 seats to Cancun that the airline would offer the group a30% discount on the going airfare to a group of 5 people. In someembodiments, the application 360 can alert an administrator (or otherindividual) associated with the application 360 that a particulartrigger event has occurred, and that one or more groups have beenidentified that meet the conditions of the trigger event. Theadministrator can then create an offer at that time for the groups. Theadministrator can also, in some embodiments, view the profiles 365 ofthe groups in determining what offer to make to the groups. In someembodiments, the application 360 can create an offer package for thegroup of multiple items. In these embodiments, the application 360 cancreate, for example, a travel package of airfare, hotel, lift tickets,etc, for the group that creates an entire trip. The application 360 canuse the profiles 365 of the members of the group to select the variousitems to offer from the catalogue. To identify the items that can begrouped together for the offer the application 360 may pass the groupprofile through the recommender system.

Once the offer is prepared it is provided to the members of the group.This is illustrated at step 570. The members of the group can then actupon the offer. This is illustrated at step 580. In some embodiments,the offer requires the group to act on the offer as a group and not asindividuals. The application 360 can further update the profiles 365 ofthe members to indicate whether the offer was accepted by the group orrejected (e.g. not acted upon) by the group. This information allows forthe application 360 to refine its models as to which groups are providedwith the offers. Further, when the offer is accepted by one group, theoffer can be rescinded from the other groups that were offered theoffer.

FIG. 6 is a flow diagram of a process for providing recommendations thatgo against a currently existing profile for an individual or a group,according to illustrative embodiments. A contrary recommendation isprovided to the user when there is other information available to theapplication 360 that indicates that the normal profile is inappropriate.Conditions where the current profile is not appropriate could arisefrom, for example, an injury to the person, a change in dietarypreferences, a change in weather, a religious holiday, a change in thelocation, etc. Typically, these conditions are only temporary in nature,and as such, do not require the regeneration or wholesale updating ofthe user's profile, as the temporary nature of the condition means thatthe original profile will again be relevant. The process discussedherein can be implemented using the natural language processing systemdiscussed above with respect to FIGS. 1 and 2, and the recommendersystems discussed above with respect to FIG. 3.

The process begins by accessing or obtaining the user's profile. This isillustrated at step 610. The user's profile is in some embodiments,obtained from the profile store. The profile can either be an individualprofile or a group profile. This profile can be generated by any methodof generating a user profile. In some embodiments, the profiles 365 arethe profiles that were generated for use by the application 360 in FIG.4 or 5. In some embodiments, the profiles 365 are generated according tothe processes discussed above. If the user does not have a profile inprofile store the profile can be generated at this step.

Once the profile has been accessed the application 360 examines the databehind the profile to determine if a condition has occurred that couldindicate that the current profile is not appropriate for makingrecommendations. This is illustrated at step 620. At this step theapplication 360 processes the data from the various data sources todetermine if there is an indication that a trigger condition hasoccurred to the user. These trigger conditions can be predefined by theapplication 360, or they may be learned using machine learningtechniques. For example, during a scrape of the user's social mediafeed, the application 360 finds a post that indicates that theindividual was recently at the hospital for a sprained ankle, and willbe unable to run for 2 weeks. This application 360 determines that thispost is a trigger condition that has occurred. In another example, theapplication 360 during a scrape finds a post from a member of a groupthat indicates that the group has spent the past five days eating pubfood. This post would be considered a trigger condition. Again, theapplication 360 using the natural language processing system canidentify any number of trigger conditions. The trigger conditions areannotated or tagged with information that indicates what activities areincompatible with the trigger condition. In the example of the sprainedankle, activities that involve running or extensive walking would benoted as incompatible, while stationary or minimal walking activitieswould be considered compatible. In the example of eating pub food for 5days straight, recommendations for high fat high caloric restaurants canbe considered incompatible with this condition, while healthy eatingestablishments would be considered compatible.

Following the determination of a trigger condition the application 360determines the duration of the trigger condition. This is illustrated atstep 625. The application 360 can use the natural language processingsystem determine the duration of the trigger condition. For example, inthe case of the sprained ankle, the application 360 would determine thatthe trigger condition will last 2 weeks based off of the information inthe post. In some instances, the application 360 accesses other sourcesof information to determine the duration of the trigger condition. Forexample, if the post about the sprain did not include how long theywould be out, the application 360 can access the internet or othersources, and determine how long it usually takes to recover from asprained ankle. With this information, the application 360 would assignthe trigger condition the determined duration for the condition.

These determined trigger conditions are stored in the profile storealong with the associated profile. This is illustrated at step 630. Thisassociation allows the recommender engine to acquire the triggerconditions as well as the associated profile. In some embodiments, thetrigger conditions are added into the user profile. In some embodiments,a pointer to the trigger conditions is inserted in the profile, and thetrigger conditions exist as a separate part of the profile store. Alsostored with the trigger conditions is an indication of a duration of thetrigger condition. Again, it should be noted that the trigger conditionsdoes not modify the underlying profile.

The application 360 proceeds to operate as normal, and at some pointafter the formation of the trigger condition a recommendation isrequested. This is illustrated at step 640. This recommendation requestcould come from the application 360 responding to a trigger event, suchas the trigger events discussed above. In some embodiments, the user mayask for a recommendation from the application 360. In other embodiments,the user may request or receive a recommendation from otherapplications.

The recommendation is generated by recommender system in response to therecommendation request. This is illustrated at step 650. The recommendersystem generates the recommendation based on the information containedin the profile. This recommendation or list of recommendations can bepassed to the application 360. In some embodiments, the recommendationsystem uses the trigger conditions to filter recommendations that areprovided to the application 360. For example, if the profile indicatesthat the individual likes to run, the recommender system may generate asa top recommendation a location that has fantastic running conditionsand locations. However, because the individual has recently sprainedtheir ankle this recommendation is less likely to be valuable to them.The recommender engine can access the trigger conditions associated withthe profile to augment the profile. Using the trigger conditions therecommender engine can filter out recommendations that are incompatiblewith trigger conditions.

The recommendations are provided to the application 360. This isillustrated at step 660. The application 360 can review therecommendations that are provided by the recommender system to determineif the recommendations are appropriate for the user. The application 360can access the trigger conditions associated with the profile andcompare the recommendations to the trigger conditions. Ifrecommendations are found that are not compatible with the triggerconditions, the application 360 can filter these recommendations fromthe output that is generated and presented to the user. This application360 can perform this filtering regardless if the recommendation systememployed the filters as well. The user is then presented withrecommendations that take into account the restraints that are caused bythe trigger condition. The display of the recommendations to the user isillustrated at step 670.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart illustrating a process, according to embodiments,of providing proactive recommendations of recreational activities. Therecommendations can be based on matching of stored detailed informationand publicly available data, historical data about an individual orgroups of individuals, with available public and licensed informationabout activities within a particular distance range from a givenlocation, taking several external factors in consideration, such as thelocation, the date, the current weather, travel warnings, and specialevents/offers taking place within a predetermined range of a particularlocation.

The system will also review the feedback from licensed or publiclyavailable data feedback from each activity to learn about the quality ofthe recommended activity, its popularity, and the compatibility of theactivity based on the insights provided by the review data. The systemleverages the wisdom of the crowds, found as unstructured data acrossthe Internet (i.e., to find ideal activities, and provides context onthe activity itself (i.e. an activity might be popular but has badreviews), and context related to the user (i.e. individuals similar toyou prefer activity x).

The system extracts insight into the individual and his companion'sinformation, and separately, it extracts insight into availableactivities, based on the available data. The system then acts as abroker, linking each individual or group of individuals, with the idealavailable set of activities. Both parties (individual and activityprovider) benefit from enabling them to find each other. The individualis able to do the activities that they would enjoy the most during alimited window of time at a location (either familiar or unfamiliar,local or remote, etc.), and the activity provider benefits by increasingbusiness based on customer affinity and positive feedback from previouscustomers.

The system is in some embodiments adaptable, self-learning andself-tuning, to increase the accuracy of its recommendations over time.The system receives feedback from its users, after a recommendation issuggested, or the recommendation is taken by the user (e.g. through “Irecommend” feedback button). This information is then provided back tothe recommender engine for tuning of the recommendations that areprovided.

The system enables the users (individuals using the application) toprovide their profile information. This is illustrated at step 710. Thiscan be done with, for example, a simple questionnaire, or with gettingtheir data feed from their social network of their choice (e.g.Facebook, Twitter, etc.). The processes discussed above with respect toFIGS. 4-6 for generating a profile can be used at this step.

The system stores key information that can be used to match individualsas against available activities. This is illustrated at step 720. Someof the data obtained can include things, places or events that theindividuals indicated or were determined by the profile builder thatthey like, personality insights from their write ups, aggregation ofdata obtained via background images from their pictures (beach photos,nature photos, sport activities, etc.). This information can is storedwith the profiles in the profile store.

The system will store the same information above, for other users of thesystem, and can indicate that they're part of the same travel group asother users. This is illustrated at step 730. This will generate anadditional “travel group profile”, which as its own entity, will haveits own weighted set of aggregated interests, personality, dislikes,etc. Additional members of a travel party can be added by providing aprofile with public data (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, blogs, social media,etc.), so the system can automatically determine their personality andother insights, and add them as part of the “travel group profile”.Groups can also be either pre-designated by the user or cognitivelydefined through the user's regular social media contacts/friends).

The system identifies the key metadata about activities at differentlocations and stores this information. This is illustrated at step 740.The identification of locations and activities can be done using theprocesses discussed above with respect to FIGS. 4-6. Each activity willhave its own logical profile that will determine its popularity, rating,and affinity with potential individuals. Each activity can have acorresponding profile in the profiles store 365. Each activity can havea “quality rating” to prevent the recommendation engine 350 fromsuggesting activities with a high consensus of low quality, and alsoadjusting a highly popular activity that may not be as good quality(i.e. tourist traps). The system can determine the sentiment of writtentext, sound or video about a particular activity, and aggregate thisinformation in the “quality ranking” method.

The system can also create profiles for the authors of the reviews. Thisis illustrated at step 745. The system can, for example, store metadatainformation about authors of articles, reviews, or blogs about aparticular activity, and provide personality insights and other methodsto determine a profile for those authors and/or reviewers, and theirrating/opinion of that particular activity, to be used as a factor todetermine affinity of the activity with individuals with similarinterests. It will also determine this rank information for otheractivities talked about by this author. These are stored as authorprofiles within the profile store.

The system identifies matches of the user profile and/or the “travelgroup profile” with other similar user profiles, “activity profiles” and“author profiles”. This is illustrated at step 750. The system can thenassign a rank of similarity between these users. This ranking systemwill allow the system to uncover activities that may be of interest tousers based on people similar and with similar interests that may nothave been suggested otherwise.

The system determines and provides a list of suggested activities (orrecommendations) for any user of the application 360, based on theircurrent location. This is illustrated at step 760. The system matchesthe travel profile, or travel group profile, with activities that are inclose proximity to their current (or specified) location. The activitieswill be determined based on the type of activity (food, sport,nightlife, etc.). For the specified type of activity, the systemsearches for available options within a distance range of the user'slocation. The distance range can be input by the user when creatingtheir corresponding profile, or can be determined by theapplication/system. For each activity determines if this is a feasibleactivity based on the date/time, season and weather. For example: Is theactivity only open during summer? Is a concert that is during theweekend? Is there a storm coming that may affect the suggested activity?In some embodiments, the system can determine a weighed recommendation,by matching the available pool of high “quality ranking” activities thatmatches the user's interests, likes, and historical information (similaractivities in other places). In some embodiments, the system adds as afactor for consideration of the recommendation, affinity with otherusers and “authors” that have recommended the activity.

The system returns to the application 360 a result list ofrecommendations. This is illustrated at step 770. The recommendationscan include the probability that the individual/travel group will likethe specific activity (e.g. Activity A 90% chance; Activity B—85%chance). The individual/individual group will have the chance to provideimmediate feedback (e.g. “do not recommend again”), and/or experiencedfeedback (e.g. “I recommend”, “did not like”, “more recommendations likethis”, etc.). Individual groups will also have the chance to providefeedback as individual and vote to determine what is the consensus ofthe group. The individual can also provide their feedback in real timeto provide better insights into the time and location of when theindividual had positive or negative experience during their trip, andallow the system to replicate the highlights of their trip in futuretravel occasions. This information can be fed back to the recommendationsystem 300 and/or into the associated profiles for the correspondingactivities, users, authors, etc. in order to update the correspondinginformation.

Referring now to FIG. 8, shown is a high-level block diagram of anexample computer system 801 that may be used in implementing one or moreof the methods, tools, and modules, and any related functions, describedherein (e.g., using one or more processor circuits or computerprocessors of the computer), in accordance with embodiments of thepresent disclosure. In some embodiments, the major components of thecomputer system 801 may comprise one or more CPUs 802, a memorysubsystem 804, a terminal interface 812, a storage interface 816, an I/O(Input/Output) device interface 814, and a network interface 818, all ofwhich may be communicatively coupled, directly or indirectly, forinter-component communication via a memory bus 803, an I/O bus 808, andan I/O bus interface unit 810.

The computer system 801 may contain one or more general-purposeprogrammable central processing units (CPUs) 802A, 802B, 802C, and 802D,herein generically referred to as the CPU 802. In some embodiments, thecomputer system 801 may contain multiple processors typical of arelatively large system; however, in other embodiments the computersystem 801 may alternatively be a single CPU system. Each CPU 802 mayexecute instructions stored in the memory subsystem 804 and may includeone or more levels of on-board cache.

System memory 804 may include computer system readable media in the formof volatile memory, such as random access memory (RAM) 822 or cachememory 824. Computer system 801 may further include otherremovable/non-removable, volatile/non-volatile computer system storagemedia. By way of example only, storage system 826 can be provided forreading from and writing to a non-removable, non-volatile magneticmedia, such as a “hard drive.” Although not shown, a magnetic disk drivefor reading from and writing to a removable, non-volatile magnetic disk(e.g., a “floppy disk”), or an optical disk drive for reading from orwriting to a removable, non-volatile optical disc such as a CD-ROM,DVD-ROM or other optical media can be provided. In addition, memory 804can include flash memory, e.g., a flash memory stick drive or a flashdrive. Memory devices can be connected to memory bus 803 by one or moredata media interfaces. The memory 804 may include at least one programproduct having a set (e.g., at least one) of program modules that areconfigured to carry out the functions of various embodiments.

Although the memory bus 803 is shown in FIG. 8 as a single bus structureproviding a direct communication path among the CPUs 802, the memorysubsystem 804, and the I/O bus interface 810, the memory bus 803 may, insome embodiments, include multiple different buses or communicationpaths, which may be arranged in any of various forms, such aspoint-to-point links in hierarchical, star or web configurations,multiple hierarchical buses, parallel and redundant paths, or any otherappropriate type of configuration. Furthermore, while the I/O businterface 810 and the I/O bus 808 are shown as single respective units,the computer system 801 may, in some embodiments, contain multiple I/Obus interface units 810, multiple I/O buses 808, or both. Further, whilemultiple I/O interface units are shown, which separate the I/O bus 808from various communications paths running to the various I/O devices, inother embodiments some or all of the I/O devices may be connecteddirectly to one or more system I/O buses.

In some embodiments, the computer system 801 may be a multi-usermainframe computer system, a single-user system, or a server computer orsimilar device that has little or no direct user interface, but receivesrequests from other computer systems (clients). Further, in someembodiments, the computer system 801 may be implemented as a desktopcomputer, portable computer, laptop or notebook computer, tabletcomputer, pocket computer, telephone, smart phone, network switches orrouters, or any other appropriate type of electronic device.

It is noted that FIG. 8 is intended to depict the representative majorcomponents of an exemplary computer system 801. In some embodiments,however, individual components may have greater or lesser complexitythan as represented in FIG. 5, components other than or in addition tothose shown in FIG. 8 may be present, and the number, type, andconfiguration of such components may vary.

One or more programs/utilities 828, each having at least one set ofprogram modules 830 may be stored in memory 804. The programs/utilities828 may include a hypervisor (also referred to as a virtual machinemonitor), one or more operating systems, one or more applicationprograms, other program modules, and program data. Each of the operatingsystems, one or more application programs, other program modules, andprogram data or some combination thereof, may include an implementationof a networking environment. Programs 828 and/or program modules 830generally perform the functions or methodologies of various embodiments.

It is to be understood that although this disclosure includes a detaileddescription on cloud computing, implementation of the teachings recitedherein are not limited to a cloud computing environment. Rather,embodiments of the present invention are capable of being implemented inconjunction with any other type of computing environment now known orlater developed.

Cloud computing is a model of service delivery for enabling convenient,on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computingresources (e.g., networks, network bandwidth, servers, processing,memory, storage, applications, virtual machines, and services) that canbe rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort orinteraction with a provider of the service. This cloud model may includeat least five characteristics, at least three service models, and atleast four deployment models.

Characteristics are as follows:

On-demand self-service: a cloud consumer can unilaterally provisioncomputing capabilities, such as server time and network storage, asneeded automatically without requiring human interaction with theservice's provider.

Broad network access: capabilities are available over a network andaccessed through standard mechanisms that promote use by heterogeneousthin or thick client platforms (e.g., mobile phones, laptops, and PDAs).

Resource pooling: the provider's computing resources are pooled to servemultiple consumers using a multi-tenant model, with different physicaland virtual resources dynamically assigned and reassigned according todemand. There is a sense of location independence in that the consumergenerally has no control or knowledge over the exact location of theprovided resources but may be able to specify location at a higher levelof abstraction (e.g., country, state, or datacenter).

Rapid elasticity: capabilities can be rapidly and elasticallyprovisioned, in some cases automatically, to quickly scale out andrapidly released to quickly scale in. To the consumer, the capabilitiesavailable for provisioning often appear to be unlimited and can bepurchased in any quantity at any time.

Measured service: cloud systems automatically control and optimizeresource use by leveraging a metering capability at some level ofabstraction appropriate to the type of service (e.g., storage,processing, bandwidth, and active user accounts). Resource usage can bemonitored, controlled, and reported, providing transparency for both theprovider and consumer of the utilized service.

Service Models are as follows:

Software as a Service (SaaS): the capability provided to the consumer isto use the provider's applications running on a cloud infrastructure.The applications are accessible from various client devices through athin client interface such as a web browser (e.g., web-based e-mail).The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloudinfrastructure including network, servers, operating systems, storage,or even individual application capabilities, with the possible exceptionof limited user-specific application configuration settings.

Platform as a Service (PaaS): the capability provided to the consumer isto deploy onto the cloud infrastructure consumer-created or acquiredapplications created using programming languages and tools supported bythe provider. The consumer does not manage or control the underlyingcloud infrastructure including networks, servers, operating systems, orstorage, but has control over the deployed applications and possiblyapplication hosting environment configurations.

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS): the capability provided to theconsumer is to provision processing, storage, networks, and otherfundamental computing resources where the consumer is able to deploy andrun arbitrary software, which can include operating systems andapplications. The consumer does not manage or control the underlyingcloud infrastructure but has control over operating systems, storage,deployed applications, and possibly limited control of select networkingcomponents (e.g., host firewalls).

Deployment Models are as follows:

Private cloud: the cloud infrastructure is operated solely for anorganization. It may be managed by the organization or a third party andmay exist on-premises or off-premises.

Community cloud: the cloud infrastructure is shared by severalorganizations and supports a specific community that has shared concerns(e.g., mission, security requirements, policy, and complianceconsiderations). It may be managed by the organizations or a third partyand may exist on-premises or off-premises.

Public cloud: the cloud infrastructure is made available to the generalpublic or a large industry group and is owned by an organization sellingcloud services.

Hybrid cloud: the cloud infrastructure is a composition of two or moreclouds (private, community, or public) that remain unique entities butare bound together by standardized or proprietary technology thatenables data and application portability (e.g., cloud bursting forload-balancing between clouds).

A cloud computing environment is service oriented with a focus onstatelessness, low coupling, modularity, and semantic interoperability.At the heart of cloud computing is an infrastructure that includes anetwork of interconnected nodes.

The systems 100, 200, 300 may be employed in a cloud computingenvironment. FIG. 9, is a diagrammatic representation of an illustrativecloud computing environment 950 according to one embodiment. As shown,cloud computing environment 950 comprises one or more cloud computingnodes 910 with which local computing devices used by cloud consumers,such as, for example, personal digital assistant (PDA) or cellulartelephone 954A, desktop computer 954B, laptop computer 954C, and/orautomobile computer system 954N may communicate. Nodes 910 maycommunicate with one another. They may be grouped (not shown) physicallyor virtually, in one or more networks, such as Private, Community,Public, or Hybrid clouds as described hereinabove, or a combinationthereof. This allows cloud computing environment 950 to offerinfrastructure, platforms and/or software as services for which a cloudconsumer does not need to maintain resources on a local computingdevice. It is understood that the types of computing devices 954A-Nshown in FIG. 9 are intended to be illustrative only and that computingnodes 10 and cloud computing environment 950 may communicate with anytype of computerized device over any type of network and/or networkaddressable connection (e.g., using a web browser).

Referring now to FIG. 10, a set of functional abstraction layersprovided by cloud computing environment 950 (FIG. 9) is shown. It shouldbe understood in advance that the components, layers, and functionsshown in FIG. 10 are intended to be illustrative only and embodiments ofthe disclosure are not limited thereto. As depicted, the followinglayers and corresponding functions are provided:

Hardware and software layer 1060 includes hardware and softwarecomponents. Examples of hardware components include: mainframes 1061;RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer) architecture based servers 1062;servers 1063; blade servers 1064; storage devices 1065; and networks andnetworking components 1066. In some embodiments, software componentsinclude network application server software 1067 and database software1068.

Virtualization layer 1070 provides an abstraction layer from which thefollowing examples of virtual entities may be provided: virtual servers1071; virtual storage 1072; virtual networks 1073, including virtualprivate networks; virtual applications and operating systems 1074; andvirtual clients 1075.

In one example, management layer 1080 may provide the functionsdescribed below. Resource provisioning 1081 provides dynamic procurementof computing resources and other resources that are utilized to performtasks within the cloud computing environment. Metering and Pricing 1082provide cost tracking as resources are utilized within the cloudcomputing environment, and billing or invoicing for consumption of theseresources. In one example, these resources may comprise applicationsoftware licenses. Security provides identity verification for cloudconsumers and tasks, as well as protection for data and other resources.User portal 1083 provides access to the cloud computing environment forconsumers and system administrators. Service level management 1084provides cloud computing resource allocation and management such thatrequired service levels are met. Service Level Agreement (SLA) planningand fulfillment 1085 provide pre-arrangement for, and procurement of,cloud computing resources for which a future requirement is anticipatedin accordance with an SLA.

Workloads layer 1090 provides examples of functionality for which thecloud computing environment may be utilized. Examples of workloads andfunctions which may be provided from this layer include: mapping andnavigation 1091; software development and lifecycle management 1092;virtual classroom education delivery 1093; data analytics processing1094; transaction processing 1095; and database 1096.

The present invention may be a system, a method, and/or a computerprogram product at any possible technical detail level of integration.The computer program product may include a computer readable storagemedium (or media) having computer readable program instructions thereonfor causing a processor to carry out aspects of the present invention.

The computer readable storage medium can be a tangible device that canretain and store instructions for use by an instruction executiondevice. The computer readable storage medium may be, for example, but isnot limited to, an electronic storage device, a magnetic storage device,an optical storage device, an electromagnetic storage device, asemiconductor storage device, or any suitable combination of theforegoing. A non-exhaustive list of more specific examples of thecomputer readable storage medium includes the following: a portablecomputer diskette, a hard disk, a random access memory (RAM), aread-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROMor Flash memory), a static random access memory (SRAM), a portablecompact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), a digital versatile disk (DVD),a memory stick, a floppy disk, a mechanically encoded device such aspunch-cards or raised structures in a groove having instructionsrecorded thereon, and any suitable combination of the foregoing. Acomputer readable storage medium, as used herein, is not to be construedas being transitory signals per se, such as radio waves or other freelypropagating electromagnetic waves, electromagnetic waves propagatingthrough a waveguide or other transmission media (e.g., light pulsespassing through a fiber-optic cable), or electrical signals transmittedthrough a wire.

Computer readable program instructions described herein can bedownloaded to respective computing/processing devices from a computerreadable storage medium or to an external computer or external storagedevice via a network, for example, the Internet, a local area network, awide area network and/or a wireless network. The network may comprisecopper transmission cables, optical transmission fibers, wirelesstransmission, routers, firewalls, switches, gateway computers and/oredge servers. A network adapter card or network interface in eachcomputing/processing device receives computer readable programinstructions from the network and forwards the computer readable programinstructions for storage in a computer readable storage medium withinthe respective computing/processing device.

Computer readable program instructions for carrying out operations ofthe present invention may be assembler instructions,instruction-set-architecture (ISA) instructions, machine instructions,machine dependent instructions, microcode, firmware instructions,state-setting data, configuration data for integrated circuitry, oreither source code or object code written in any combination of one ormore programming languages, including an object oriented programminglanguage such as Smalltalk, C++, or the like, and procedural programminglanguages, such as the “C” programming language or similar programminglanguages. The computer readable program instructions may executeentirely on the user's computer, partly on the user's computer, as astand-alone software package, partly on the user's computer and partlyon a remote computer or entirely on the remote computer or server. Inthe latter scenario, the remote computer may be connected to the user'scomputer through any type of network, including a local area network(LAN) or a wide area network (WAN), or the connection may be made to anexternal computer (for example, through the Internet using an InternetService Provider). In some embodiments, electronic circuitry including,for example, programmable logic circuitry, field-programmable gatearrays (FPGA), or programmable logic arrays (PLA) may execute thecomputer readable program instructions by utilizing state information ofthe computer readable program instructions to personalize the electroniccircuitry, in order to perform aspects of the present invention.

Aspects of the present invention are described herein with reference toflowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams of methods, apparatus(systems), and computer program products according to embodiments of theinvention. It will be understood that each block of the flowchartillustrations and/or block diagrams, and combinations of blocks in theflowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams, can be implemented bycomputer readable program instructions.

These computer readable program instructions may be provided to aprocessor of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, orother programmable data processing apparatus to produce a machine, suchthat the instructions, which execute via the processor of the computeror other programmable data processing apparatus, create means forimplementing the functions/acts specified in the flowchart and/or blockdiagram block or blocks. These computer readable program instructionsmay also be stored in a computer readable storage medium that can directa computer, a programmable data processing apparatus, and/or otherdevices to function in a particular manner, such that the computerreadable storage medium having instructions stored therein comprises anarticle of manufacture including instructions which implement aspects ofthe function/act specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram blockor blocks.

The computer readable program instructions may also be loaded onto acomputer, other programmable data processing apparatus, or other deviceto cause a series of operational steps to be performed on the computer,other programmable apparatus or other device to produce a computerimplemented process, such that the instructions which execute on thecomputer, other programmable apparatus, or other device implement thefunctions/acts specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block orblocks.

The flowchart and block diagrams in the Figures illustrate thearchitecture, functionality, and operation of possible implementationsof systems, methods, and computer program products according to variousembodiments of the present invention. In this regard, each block in theflowchart or block diagrams may represent a module, segment, or portionof instructions, which comprises one or more executable instructions forimplementing the specified logical function(s). In some alternativeimplementations, the functions noted in the blocks may occur out of theorder noted in the Figures. For example, two blocks shown in successionmay, in fact, be executed substantially concurrently, or the blocks maysometimes be executed in the reverse order, depending upon thefunctionality involved. It will also be noted that each block of theblock diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, and combinations of blocksin the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, can be implementedby special purpose hardware-based systems that perform the specifiedfunctions or acts or carry out combinations of special purpose hardwareand computer instructions.

The descriptions of the various embodiments of the present disclosurehave been presented for purposes of illustration, but are not intendedto be exhaustive or limited to the embodiments disclosed. Manymodifications and variations will be apparent to those of ordinary skillin the art without departing from the scope and spirit of the describedembodiments. The terminology used herein was chosen to explain theprinciples of the embodiments, the practical application or technicalimprovement over technologies found in the marketplace, or to enableothers of ordinary skill in the art to understand the embodimentsdisclosed herein.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method of providing a group recommendation comprising: defining a group, the group having at least one member; creating a group profile for the group, the group profile including at least one activity and a set of conditions for the at least one activity; identifying for the set of conditions a corresponding set of trigger events; monitoring a plurality of electronic data sources for information related to the set of conditions; comparing the monitored set of conditions with the set of trigger events; determining that the monitored set of conditions meets a threshold associated with the set of trigger events; and generating an alert in response to the set of monitored conditions exceeding the threshold.
 2. The method of claim 1 wherein creating the group profile further comprises, receiving the at least one activity from the at least one member.
 3. The method of claim 1 wherein at least one condition in the set of conditions is added to the group profile without input from the at least one member.
 4. The method of claim 1 wherein creating the group profile further comprises, scanning social media profiles of the at least one member to identify additional interests of the at least one member and incorporates the identified additional interests for the at least one member in to the group profile.
 5. The method of claim 1 wherein at least a portion of the set of trigger events are based upon a determined set of locations derived from the at least one activity.
 6. The method of claim 1 wherein the plurality of electronic data sources to be monitored are determined at least in part by the set of conditions for the at least one activity.
 7. The method of claim 1 wherein the information related to the set of conditions is in natural language, extracted from a corresponding electronic data source and processed through a natural language processor.
 8. The method of claim 1 wherein the set of trigger events is prioritized such that only a portion of the set of trigger events is initially monitored and compared.
 9. A computer program product having computer executable instructions that when executed by at least one computer having at least one processor, executes a method for making a group recommendation comprising: defining a group, the group having at least one member; creating a group profile for the group, the group profile including at least one activity and a set of conditions for the at least one activity; identifying for the set of conditions a corresponding set of trigger events; monitoring a plurality of electronic data sources for information related to the set of conditions; comparing the monitored set of conditions with the set of trigger events; determining that the monitored set of conditions meets a threshold associated with the set of trigger events; and generating an alert in response to the set of monitored conditions exceeding the threshold.
 10. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein creating the group profile further comprises, receiving the at least one activity from the at least one member.
 11. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein at least one condition in the set of conditions is added to the group profile without input from the at least one member.
 12. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein creating the group profile further comprises, scanning social media profiles of the at least one member to identify additional interests of the at least one member and incorporates the identified additional interests for the at least one member in to the group profile.
 13. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein at least a portion of the set of trigger events are based upon a determined set of locations derived from the at least one activity.
 14. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein the plurality of electronic data sources to be monitored are determined at least in part by the set of conditions for the at least one activity.
 15. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein the information related to the set of conditions is in natural language, extracted from a corresponding electronic data source and processed through a natural language processor.
 16. The computer program product of claim 9 wherein the set of trigger events is prioritized such that only a portion of the set of trigger events is initially monitored and compared.
 17. A recommendation system configured to provide recommendations to at least one user comprising: at least one processor; at least one memory component; a recommender engine configured to provide a recommendation to the at least one user; the recommendation system configured to execute a method of: defining a group, the group having at least one member; creating a group profile for the group, the group profile including at least one activity and a set of conditions for the at least one activity; identifying for the set of conditions a corresponding set of trigger events; monitoring a plurality of electronic data sources for information related to the set of conditions; comparing the monitored set of conditions with the set of trigger events; determining that the monitored set of conditions meets a threshold associated with the set of trigger events; and generating an alert in response to the set of monitored conditions exceeding the threshold.
 18. The system of claim 17 wherein at least one condition in the set of conditions is added to the group profile without input from the at least one member.
 19. The system of claim 18 wherein creating the group profile further comprises, scanning social media profiles of the at least one member to identify additional interests of the at least one member and incorporates the identified additional interests for the at least one member in to the group profile.
 20. The system of claim 19 wherein the information related to the set of conditions is in natural language, extracted from a corresponding electronic data source and processed through a natural language processor. 